Translation Consolidation: ITI Acquires Proficiency

I cant fault Rowe for picking up all the wrong messages from ITI's acquisition of Proficiency. Many others before him have done the same thing when it comes to interop. Contrary to his conclusions, here is my take on this:1. Proficiency failed and failed miserably. Their technology never worked even after spending close to $50M. It should have been shut down 3-4 years ago. I heard one CAD vendor, whose product Proficiency supported, refer to it as 'garbage'.2. ITI bought them for (my guess) peanuts. No details of the financial transaction was disclosed. Need I say more?3. ITI has to put a brave face on this ludicrous deal. They have bought useless technology that they cant make work either. Time will prove me right. The CAD ISVs will make sure they dont succeed. 4. Interop market is $5B? Only if you are smoking some heady stuff from Afghanistan. Companies would rather turn off their CAD systems than pay for interop. 5. JT is a visualization format and thats that. It cant do anything for interop and Siemens knows it. Jeff can attempt to put (interop) lipstick on a pig, but its still a pig. 6. Jeff is right about one thing: CAD interop will never be solved, for the simple reason interop is an occupational (& mathematical) hazard in CAD.Read this article for what it is: a positive spin on a worthless story (Proficiency acquistion) and a thinly disguised boost for a advertiser (Siemens & JT). Calling interop the bright spot means the CAD industry in deeper trouble than we perceive it to be.